


Angels who have bestial eyes

by Crazyamoeba



Category: Far Cry 5
Genre: All these pairings are very much 'if you squint', Gen, Jealousy, John Seed is an intensely jealous creature, M/M, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, all around, and all that comes with the territory, make of it what you will my ducklings, obviously, they could all be interpreted as intense platonic, tw: cults
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-10
Updated: 2018-04-10
Packaged: 2019-04-21 06:16:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14278668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crazyamoeba/pseuds/Crazyamoeba
Summary: The Deputy is trying to hard to be worthy of the Father's love. John Seed is the one who will make him clean, take his sins away so he can be at the Father's side. Because that is the calling of the Baptist.And yet, there is something in the way that John looks at him. It makes him want to beg for a forgiveness that he does not recognise.





	Angels who have bestial eyes

**Author's Note:**

> This is a kind of alternative universe in which the Deputy, at some point during the events of the game, decides that sometimes it is not only best to leave well enough alone, but also best to join the People at Eden's Gate.

 

* * *

 

 

 

There is something in the way that John Seed stares that feels cold and soft, twisting and violent.

 

His face is smooth beneath the beard, smile easy and gentle, eyes deep and calm where they rest. The Deputy thinks it is not entirely unlike the water that is smoothing over his body with edgeless grace. Calmly embracing him on the incongruously calm day that John is preparing to lower him – far more gently this time – underneath the stream. Baptising him, welcoming him.

 

Loving him, Joseph says.

 

And although he cannot fault the care in John's touch, the softness with which he reaches for him and handles him, it cannot escape his notice that the baptism is being conducted under the watchful eyes of Joseph, while Jacob and Faith wait by the edges of the water.

 

When he was first led to the water, for just a moment before John took his hand, he saw Jacob's perfectly schooled expression of neutral disinterest, lit only by the keenness of his gaze, unwavering in its scrutiny of John's movements.

He remembers Faith's sweet and approving smile as she watched him prepare to be welcomed into the fold. Her eyes, soft and brimming with love, glint with an unknown edge as they traced the tension in John's arms, weighing up the pressure with which John held his hands, just how much John's fingers curled into the flesh of his shoulder.

 

It felt like a secret, a missing step, and it knocked him gently off kilter as surely as John did when his hands gently and surely forced him backwards, down and under, under, all the way under until everything else dissolved into the watery sunlight fading above him.

 

He worried, distantly and without consequence, about the calmness that drifted over him in time with the gentle current.

Air trapped and leaking from his lungs and eyes failing to strain, he was only really aware of the pleasure to be found in the dark, cool protection of the water. Of how it felt for all the overwhelming sights and sounds of the world above to be dimmed, muted, softened. Slowed and soothed and restrained to a speed and lightness of touch that he could, perhaps, bear.

 

But then he was being lifted, pulled forcibly back into the stinging air on the other side, and the suddenness, the violence of resuscitation, of rebirth, was momentarily all too much.

 

He tried so desperately to keep his heaving, shuddering gasps as dry as one so recently baptised could hope to.

 

John's hands were firm, hard as they stroked down his back, rubbing briskly like one would a newborn puppy that didn't quite have the strength to survive its own birthing.

 

His voice was warm, low and close, and the Deputy couldn't even be sure where it was coming from other than it seemed to be all around him.

 

“Shh, it's done. It's done now, and you are one with us.” There was a warmth at his neck, and he realised that John was leaning close, speaking privately to him, shielding the words from the rest of the on-looking eyes.

 

“You are one with the Father.” The quiet voice seems to find something rough and out of place to snag on. The Deputy lifts his eyes, tries to peer through the dripping lashes to the face leaning so close to his, but finds the hand on his neck tightening and only just dancing on the line of too hard.

 

He keeps his eyes where they are, staring down into the still-shivering water.

 

“Go to him now. You are his child, and he will always welcome you.”

 

The words sound right as they drift softly to his ear, they are filling every empty space and smoothing every ragged edge that he never knew he had. Even if the words themselves still seem to be catching on their own ragged, out-of-place thread.

 

The Deputy wishes that he could turn to John, thank him for making these things possible. For cleansing him and making him worthy.

 

And yet, as he walks on heavy and unsteady legs to Joseph's outstretched arms, the urge to clutch at John, to sink to his knees before him, becomes something less akin to gratitude. It feels sharper, deeper, more like a thorn working its way steadily further between soft folds of skin.

 

It feels like guilt, and sin, and the desperate need for atonement, but ultimately something so much more base and earthy. It feels like the yearning, aching need to proclaim simply how sorry he is.

 

Except he doesn't know what he is sorry for, or why, and he feels too soft and bare for the world at this moment, and Joseph is still there at the water's edge – his shoes are wet where they weren't before – waiting with open arms like he was on the day it all began.

 

The day when he wished the cuffs that he placed on the wrists held out before him would simply dissolve and fritter away, floating into the breeze in beautiful, inconsequential particles. No more important than dust in the moonlight.

 

And here was the Father, offering it all again. Giving him another chance. Offering what nobody else could. A way to turn back time, to dismiss all those lingering, gentle regrets. To right all those devastating mistakes.

 

“It's alright.” The words are soft and gentle, but the hands that secure around his arms when he stumbles at the river bank are not. There is no violence or roughness, but they fix around his flesh with such unwavering strength and certainty that, for a moment, it is terrifying.

They pull him closer, and the Deputy finds that there is nothing else for him to do but melt and dissolve into the space made for him at the Father's chest. Crumbling and eroding and dissolving, just like the metal of those handcuffs never did.

 

“It matters not what has gone before.” The words are murmured into his ear, loving and generous and they feel like a gift, and the scratch of stubble against his forehead is shockingly male and raw. Shockingly human for one who gives so freely of himself, and who has reached deep into all of the shadow-spaces inside, has been able to shine a blinding, burning light on all the hulking things lurking there.

 

Who has embraced them, loved them and forgiven them as they have burnt and died, leaving only the emaciated hopes to crawl from the depths.

 

A being who has reached into those burnt-out husks and has been able to see, and name, and _bestow_ all those unknown things upon him...it is shocking that such a creature is human enough to have stubble, to smell ever so faintly of sunlight andsoap bars, and fresh sweat. For the distant trace of coffee to linger still on the lips which move against the Deputy's dripping hair.

 

“You are my child, and there shall be no door that is closed to you.”

 

The voice still carries with the weight of a sermon. A celebration and a commandment. A welcoming, and a warning.

 

For those children in attendance who would otherwise be reluctant to welcome one such as him into the fold. A destroyer. A non-believer. One who had come striding into their home, with clammy and ugly hands, grasping hubris, to take their Father from them. He fists his hands tightly into the well-tailored suit beneath his cheek, and tries to forget the things that the river should have taken from him.

  
He counts the white threads that twist into peculiar designs as he feels the rich rumble of Joseph's voice continue below his throat. Abstractly, he worries that his wet, filthy hands are ruining the material. He also wonders whether he would push or pull, given the opportunity.

 

But Joseph's hands, when they reach up and enfold his own, do not try to unclench his fingers or otherwise loosen his hold. They simply enclose upon his twisting, palpating fingers, and rest there, light and warm and dry, until the near-arthritic stiffness in them lessens, and he no longer feels like his whole body might seize up and squeeze his last breath of air from him. He wonders if this is what fish feel like after they have been hooked and dragged on to land.

 

He hears a light, silvery giggle, and Faith is suddenly there, breathing her laughter down the back of his neck. It chases him further into Joseph's space.

 

There is a warm and untroubled sound from above, and if both Faith and Joseph are seeing fit to laugh, he wonders whether he his fish-thoughts have perhaps broken free from the stream and reached open air.

 

Embarrassment flits briefly through his mind before being smoothed away by the hand at the back of his head, and he struggles to recapture the shame.

 

“Go with Faith and Jacob now, my child. They will welcome you to your new family.”

 

He looks down and sees a small, pale hand resting on the crook of his arm, the fingers squeezing light and soft, like butterfly feet. And then suddenly the warmth is leaving him, and the Father is extricating himself, and all of a sudden, he does not want to go with Jacob and Faith.

 

He wants to stay with the Father, he feels confusion and panic seeping into his brittle bones, and he turns because the Father mustn't leave him here all alone.

 

As he turns, he sees the water, which had frozen so still and calm around John's tall and unyielding figure, now parting for the Father. He sees Joseph reach both arms out to John, clasping his face.

 

And although John is teetering on the edges of his vision, he feels sure that he sees him lean too far and too fast, a heavy branch buffeted too often by biting winds. He feels sure that he sees him lean too heavily into the Father's touch for a simple expression of love.

 

“Hush, brother.” The words carry on the slight breeze, escaping from their intended ears, taking refuge in his. His steps falter.

 

“You have done a good thing here today. I am so very proud of you.” There is a sharp, wet sound, quickly suffocated and dragged back down to somewhere dark and deep.

 

John's face is no longer visible, it has slipped from its customary resting place against Joseph's forehead and has found a new haven in the crook of his neck.

 

There is water still clinging to his lashes, and the Deputy blinks hard, unwilling to shake his head, to shatter the image before him like coloured glass.

John's hands have fisted in Joseph's shirt sleeves, holding him at furious arms length. It makes the shape of them awkward, strained. It looks painful and strange to hold the other man so far away, yet never move his head from the space between shoulder and neck.

 

Joseph's hands rest lightly on John's elbows. Still and supporting.

 

“My John. Thank you.” Sighed from between gently curving lips, the words are warm sugar water, and even though it does not belong to him, was not meant for him, the Deputy's throat aches to swallow it whole.

 

The large hand resting on the back of John's head pats and soothes, shaking it ever so softly.

 

“I love you.”

 

Like a blessing, a sacrament, and he hears his own heart slow and calm in unison with the breath that John fights so hard to take. Joseph's other hand leaves its sentry at John's elbow, rests against his neck, thumb reaching up to trace over the face he must surely already know like his own Words.

 

 

And suddenly those soft little butterfly feet that have been resting patiently on his arm begin to grow tines. Twisting and sharp, they bite into his arm with a strange and saccharine strength that sends ice coursing through the empty spaces that Joseph had left.

 

His head feels hollowed and off-balance when he turns to face Faith. He sees the way her fingertips are burying themselves into the flesh of his arm, and it's almost like numbness except the pain filters through with unforgiving clarity.

He traces the line of her silvery, solid grasp, up to where her face tilts towards his, enquiring and playful. Her smile deepens and sweetens when he meets her eyes, and she laughs at him, tinkling and delighted.

 

“There you are!” The corners of her mouth crinkle encouragingly, and there is love sparkling in her eyes, although between those twinkling motes there is something hard and glinting. Sharp fragments of stars, not to be played with.

 

“It's time to meet your new family!” He turns back to the water again, trying to recapture the Father in his vision. The tines twist deeper, and the laugh is now less sliver bells, more warning bells chiming out through the rustling trees.

 

“You're family, now. We love you.” The stars in her eyes sharpen, and he recognises the edges there. Something not entirely civilised and damningly human. Protectiveness that she wields like a weapon.

 

“But we are all the Father's children. He has love enough for all, and you must not stand in the way of that.” The whisper is sweet and melodic, and it stings his ears. “You should allow brother John this time.”

 

“He is the one who cleansed you of everything that would keep you apart from us, made you worthy of the Father's love.” Her other hand moves to cup his cheek, warm, soft, and unyielding when it turns his head to face her.

 

Her eyes are exactly the same as her hold, and his shame is heavy and barbed when he forces it down his throat.

 

“Do not allow yourself to stray to sin so shortly after freeing yourself from it.”

 

Her eyes are bright and fierce and he feels as trapped by them as he ever did by sin. The Father's voice drifts over to him softly, falls short by his feet for the lack of breeze, and he mourns.

 

He strains to hear those words, even though they are filled with depths that are not his to journey through. They are not meant for him.

 

And then all the breath he has jealously hoarded is knocked from his body when a large, rough hand crashes into the back of his neck, digs deep into hollows there. Finds the vulnerable spaces and nestles there, hard, knowing and unerringly prepared to trip over the other side of threatening.

 

“If you do not move,” the voice is low and gentle by his ear, like earth moving, and his knees would fail him if not for the carefully balanced grip, “I will make sure that Joseph knows that you are weak. That you lack control.”

  
A finger contracts and relaxes, stroking at his pulse point, soothing and full of promise.

 

“That you are not yet worthy of a place by his side.” Jacob dips his head, encourages the Deputy to meet his gaze. “There's no shame in that. It's okay.”

 

The words rumble against all the places where his blunt, calloused fingertips can't and won't reach, and he so wants to take such comfort and drift away from all its entry requirements.

 

“There's no shame in needing to be taught. That's why I do what I do.” He rests his forehead gently against the Deputy's, who finds the little air left to him leaving his parted lips in a helpless shudder.

 

“And if you don't move, I will make it my duty to teach you. With Joseph's blessing.”

 

Jacob's head dips enquiringly, drawing fevered, eager nods in kind. His fingers land a rough pat on the back of the younger man's head, before withdrawing and leaving Faith's renewed and gentle touch to guide them.

 

The last wisps of the Father's voice dance in the air, twisting and joining with the near-silent sounds of John's wordless, wet prayers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
